ROBERT BOLTON

Marketing Magic and Illusions of Simplicity

 “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” - Arthur C. Clarke

From the introduction to the back-story to the execution of a particular set of events and techniques, a myriad of factors must go exactly right to successfully perform an illusion. This calculated multiplicity is key to the illusion’s power to fool the mind; Illusion is complexity veiled, and made to appear so simple that its appearance can only be construed as magic. It can have the effect of transforming people’s perception and definition of what is possible. It can create trust, while inspiring disbelief. Above all else, illusion makes people believe, even when they don’t trust what they are witness to.

 For centuries, magicians have passed bits and pieces of this intangible power on from generation to generation. The brotherhood and trust that has formed among illusionists is reflective of the power itself. There are always elements and intricacies of the execution that are held back and the greatest illusions of all are left for each individual, magician or not, to decode on their own.

Along with the magician’s code of secrecy though, there has also been a tradition—or sense of responsibility passed down through the world’s greatest illusionists—for skepticism and demystification. Harry Houdini debunked spiritualist séances and commissioned a book called, “The Cancer of Superstition.” While the Canadian illusionist James Randi exposed faith healers, wizards, psychics, prophets and more. Today, that tradition is upheld in the work of Penn Jillette and Raymond Joseph Teller who have been amazing and enlightening audiences with their mix of illusion, comedy, and skepticism since 1975.

Describing themselves as “a couple of eccentric guys who have learned how to do a few cool things,” their approach to magic and their populist success as magicians is strengthened by subversion. Penn and Teller thrive on debunking pseudoscientific ideas, they undermine their craft by making tricks look easy and, without breaking the magician’s code of secrecy, they continually invite their audience to discover the magic of magic. As Penn has said, “One of the things that Teller and I are obsessed with, one of the reasons that we’re in magic, is the difference between fantasy and reality.”

In marketing, the distinction between fantasy and reality can be a trivial one—particularly in tech, where consumers willingly engage with new and mystifying products though they may not understand the backend processes. Illusion relies on this tendency—misinterpretation of the total activities occurring. Illusionists often appear calm, cool and collected with many of their movements subtle and undetected, much the same as a duck crossing a pond – graceful and steady above water, but hidden beneath the surface is a flurry of movement necessary just to keep it afloat and on course. To this end, marketers can use illusion to distract and excuse the consumer from his unfamiliarity with new products and technologies. The power of illusion is to make an entire system of activities and channels materialize as one simple and magical experience for the consumer. Principles of design thinking enable brands to synthesize their many features and capabilities as a captivating narrative—an illusion. By creatively locating the illusory magic of their products, brands can leverage the power of amazement to shift perspectives and compel consumer activity. 

Apple, for example, officially describes the iPad not with a long list of technical jargon but as a “magical device.”  The illusion, in this case, plays up magic to obfuscate the complexities. The language, like the interfaces themselves, becomes a veil of illusion. The operating systems show only the top layer of their framework, making the user experience feel like magic. As Apple designer Johnny Ives contended in the iPadʼs original promotional video: “When something exceeds your ability to know how it works, it sort of becomes magical.” Behind the veil, of course there are innumerable processes occurring, but emphasis is placed on the visual and sensual rather than the technical—“It’s like holding the internet in your hands.” Instead of dwelling on practical features or the ‘technical how’ of the product, the strength of illusion is such that audiences are contented to wallow in a state of amazement and disbelief.

Similarly, Sergey Brin likens Google to ‘the mind of God’ – and it can seem that way sometimes with its uncannily accurate responses to keyword queries. While behind the scenes, transport agents mine the data and return with results algorithmically sorted by relevance, the product works so instantaneously and accurately as to seem magical, predictive and productive in the sense that it brings something out of nothing. In fact, it is the aggregate effect of aggregate activities showing forth as illusory magic, a product of faith and awe. Or as Teller reveals, “to fool the mind, you must combine at least two tricks.”

 Illusion’s ability to confound the senses buys the illusionist a currency of sort. This currency can be used throughout the duration of the spell to help reset the audience’s understanding and is something that magicians can capitalize on. For brands, that sense of spellbound infatuation translates as a unique opportunity to close sales and secure extended loyalty. For Apple and Google, the mysterious nature of magic plays on people’s need to believe, creating a cult-like following.

The magician’s oath promises “never to reveal the secret of any illusion to a non-magician, unless he swears to uphold the Magician’s Oath in turn.” Exposure of the secret is believed to remove the element of amazement. The tricks lose their ‘magic’ and instead function as intellectual puzzles. Penn and Teller however, debunkers that they are, frequently reveal their methods using transparent props. They reason that an understanding and appreciation of the mastery and cleverness of the illusion actually enhances the audience’s experience. Furthermore, Penn and Teller add twists and unexplained effects into the exposures that are even more astonishing than the original trick. Rather than ruining the magic by revealing the simplicity of the secret, they raise the stakes by educating their audience, and proceeding to astonish them still more. Entertaining an informed audience is more ambitious and rewarding than going for the cheap thrill. As consumers become increasingly technologically literate and curious—not to mention suspicious of sales jargon—brands too can benefit by demystifying their own magic. When James Dyson revolutionized the vacuum with dual cyclone technology, he made the dust container transparent so people could see how it worked. In the innovation economy, value is made not only from the ‘magical’ effects of a good product but also from the beauty of that product’s inner workings, the processes involved, and the methods that lead to it.

 To truly mesmerize his consumers, a savvy brand magician plays first into their faculties for astonishment and disbelief, and then engages their curiosity.

*originally published in M/I/S/C Magazine’s Simplicity Issue

Epiphany: Notes on Design Thinking

A more arousing word for insight is epiphany—sudden revelations of truth, from aggregate experience, and triggered by the something trivial in the present. The feeling is part of what motivates and fulfills us as thinkers. Its surprise is its power, that the thankless labor will make itself worthwhile, in a sudden and unexpected instant. The labor though—the time spent trying to make sense of the problem, rather than the moment of unfolding—is what’s important. Waiting for moments, one loses sight of motives.

Scott Berkun, in his book The Myths of Innovation, dismisses the something-out-of-nothing epiphany as naive romanticism. “The most useful way to think about epiphany,” he advises, “is as an occasional bonus of working on tough problems… When a powerful moment does happen, little knowledge is granted for how to find the next one. Even in the myths, Newton had one apple and Archimedes had one eureka. To focus on the magic moments is to miss the point.” Epiphanies are moments of synthesis, which bring to surface and purpose, the disparate chords we had already suspected would interrelate in meaningful ways. They’re the product of extensive and diverse efforts. And there are other electric ‘moments’ along the way: the hunch before, the study toward, and the articulation after that gives the epiphany its value.

The French mathematician Poincaré saw epiphanies as the accumulation of a life’s effort. He suggested that ideas become like “mobilized atoms in the unconscious, arranging and rearranging themselves in endless combinations, until finally the ‘most beautiful’ of them makes it through a ‘delicate sieve’ into full consciousness, where it will then be refined and proved.”

With cognitive frameworks like design thinking, we’d like to think we can somehow design our cognitive processes in a kind of rube goldberg mechanism arriving finally at a powerful insight, or epiphany. Can we? Part of that comes down to exposure. How do you bring together your influences? What do you spend your time reading, looking at, listening to, and discussing? How do you intuitively pull together the right bits of data and sparks of inspiration to maximize the quality of your output? I think of this as strategic or controlled exposure—creating a deliberately polymathic environment as the ‘studio.’

*A version of this piece was published in M/I/S/C Magazine’s Insight Issue.

User-Focused Party-Rocking

published in MISC Magazine, Fall 2011

and at NoodlePlay.com, January 2012

User-Focused Party-Rocking: Customer Experience in the Nightclub

Yale Fox is a DJ and nightclub sociologist living and working between Las Vegas and New York City.  In 2010, while working toward his PhD at the University of Toronto, Yale was contacted by a prominent Vegas nightclub – one of the highest rated in the world. So began Yale Fox’s transition from professional student to nightclub experience guru.  This year, Yale received a TED Fellowship for his research on how a customer’s behaviors within a system (the nightclub) are influenced by the DJ’s repertoire of song selection – as well as other factors (flashing lights, wait times, architecture, the staff and other patrons, and the unholy alchemy of Red Bull and vodka).

His company, the 194 Group, is part research lab, part experiential branding firm and part talent agency – representing an impressive roster of DJs and party hosts. For Yale, the live booking aspects of the business are more a networking tool and a signifier of their coolness equity, “when (a potential client) asks, ‘how do we know that you guys know what’s hot in music?’ Well our DJs are playing the hottest nightclubs in the world.” The talent agency maintains their presence in the nightclubs, and Yale’s thesis papers provide a theoretical grounding for their services, but “we’re a marketing firm,” he asserts, “enhancing brand experience through music.” The 194 Group refers to 194 dB, the loudest sound pressure level a human ear can perceive without being damaged – and a double entendre suggesting the Group’s ability to amplify a brand through music.

Yale’s business partner Shez Mehra (DJ Wristpect), is a world-class DJ with a b-school vernacular and sensibility, who throws around phrases like “end-user-focused party-rocking.” Shez explains that there is often a conflict between what the client wants and what the customer wants, “A lot of times, the executives from a brand, the promoters, or the venue owner, will want to dictate how we should play.” For Shez, mixing songs for the owner of the club, or for the client, would be the DJ equivalent of designing your customer experience around the disposition of the shareholder. Of course, both the relationship with end-user and with the client, need to be managed. The latter requires a certain level of trust. “The client has one goal,” says Shez. “It’s either to sell alcohol or to spread the message about their product or service to the people in the venue. We do what we do to resonate with the end-user. Once they trust us to do that, they see it unfold in front of their eyes. They see the vibe. They see the sales and they see people leaving happily with their merch and talking about their experience.”

            For Research in Motion, 194 collaborated with Maritz to architect “BBM the DJ,” a series of experiential events to launch the BlackBerry Torch. The parties, exclusively for influencers—celebrities, athletes, bloggers, and executives—as well as for sales reps from various retailers and wireless carriers, were designed to get the right people excited about the product. Attendees were given a Torch upon arrival, and could add an account that would allow them to literally BBM their requests to the DJ. A giant television monitor, dressed as a BlackBerry, displayed the requests, at which point the DJ was tasked to play as many of the requests as possible while maintaining the flow of the night. Shez characterizes this task, the improvisational element of creating a customer experience, as, “catering to the situation,” a notion that applies to many business spaces outside of the nightclub.

While Yale’s research papers are distributed and discussed within the 194 Group in the form of white papers and internal memos—both Yale and Shez are quick to point out that competence in moving dance floors is only teachable a certain point. “Its hard to plan for,” Shez tells me. “In the BlackBerry Tours across North America, every city was completely different. What worked in New York didn’t work in Boston. You have to trust your talent to get into the psyche of the crowd.”

A recent 194 Group signee, DJ Mensa who also happens to have a background in psychology and marketing, adds that DJing is like creating any number of other customer experiences: “You say something with a song. Hopefully the crowd responds. Then you say something with another song and hopefully it perpetuates the conversation. I’ve always considered DJing a customer service. Develop a vibe that will hopefully peak at the right time.”

[More from my Interview with Yale Fox after the jump]

Read More

Interview with Brian Wong

Brian Wong is the fast-tracking, twenty-year-old founder of Kiip—a software business that enables game developers and brands to reward gamers for their virtual achievements, with real-life rewards. ‘Kiiper moments,’ as Brian calls them, leverage the satisfaction of achievement, when a gamer is most engaged, for customer acquisition. You beat a level—you win a prize from a brand—relative to the weight of the achievement.

Brian is believed to be the youngest person to ever receive VC funding, and was recently named to Forbes 30 Under 30 list. Here is the unabridged version of a conversation I had with him for MISC Magazine’s Creative Challengers spread. 

Were you a big video gamer in school?

I was a huge Counterstrike fan. It will always be my favorite game.

Summarize for the non-gamer. You’re playing a Kiip-enabled game—say it’s Counterstrike. You complete a mission, what’s the user-experience as far as Kiip is involved?

We integrate directly into the games. As a user, when you level-up, get a top score or another achievement—you’ll get a notification that comes up and says ‘hey you just got a reward from Vitamin Water.’ You tap ‘Redeem’ and go back into the game, knowing that you’ve got a redemption email in your inbox. Then you take the coupon to a store and walk out with free Vitamin Water.

Tell me about the power of the moment of achievement in gaming and how you’re leveraging it.

The moment is unbelievably cool. The power is in the happiness attached to accomplishing something. It also happens to be a natural breakage in play. The screen says ‘congratulations’ and you say, ‘I’m a good player. I did a good job here.’ Reflecting on that is very powerful.

I’m trying to challenge this traditional mindset of trying to linearly evolve technology. Rather than think a mobile device is handicapped because the screen is smaller, and saying, ‘yeah, yeah - let’s make the banner ad smaller,’ why don’t you try to leverage its unique strength? I’m challenging conventional thinking about ‘attention.’ Attention has been a big part of how digital marketing has evolved. Now, it’s less about screen estate and more about experience. We’re humans. We emote. We learn and perceive things in true emotions.

In what other spaces, outside of video gaming, do you see the moments-based model coming into play?

We want to be the rewards layer for the world. Achievement moments are everywhere. You’re hearing about this trend, and the term is becoming so overused—‘the gamification of life.’ Imagine any type of social play where an achievement is acknowledged. I want to own the notion of (brands) rewarding achievements—Kiiper moments. Internally, we’ll play sports sometimes with the Kiip team and with MC Hammer who’s a close friend of the company. When I score a touchdown, that’s a Kiiper moment!

Sorry. MC Hammer? I know he’s been investing in tech…

I can’t comment on his involvement but I’ll say that Hammer understands pop culture and how these things explode. I met him a year ago at a party and told him about Kiip and he goes, “Holy Shit! This is crazy.” Ever since then, he’s had an affinity toward us, and we connect almost on a weekly basis. He’s a marketing genius. He became popular before I was born and built a brand around himself that he’s still is well known for. It’s insane. Everybody knows him. Branding. Pop culture. PR. He’s a specialist.

You had the idea for Kiip while walking the aisles of an airplane, doing what you’ve called iPad creeping; watching what people are doing on their iPads. Creeping, eavesdropping, people watching—this kind of all-the-time-research is the work of artists. Talk to me about voyeurism as creativity. Do you ideate by watching people’s behaviors?

I love people watching. It’s what I do. Like artists and creatives—they combine. It’s formalized as what they call ‘lateral thinking.’ Taking two seemingly unrelated ideas and combining them in beautiful ways. When I started thinking about games, I didn’t fully understand mobile gaming at the time. I’m not a game designer. So I said from a non-game designer perspective, ‘how can I take advantage of what I already know?’ I don’t know how to build the storylines, or graphics or spreads or isometric grids. But I can learn about the elements that a consumer perceives and how they drive attention and engagement.

I am a graphic designer. I know how to ideate visually. Sometimes when an entrepreneur has an idea, they start working on a business plan. I’d rather not write a business plan, I’d rather just mock that shit up. So I go on Photoshop and instead of writing, I visually draw it out and use that as the describer of the idea.

You’ve talked about ‘Inception’ as a sales strategy. How did that film influence your rhetorical savvy, your pitching technique and your ability to convince?

Inception is an interesting way to help people understand your idea in their own way. I don’t want to shove my idea down your throat. I’ll let them come up with my idea on their own.  I can’t really explain this but it usually takes about a month and people will come back and say they want to become a part of this. That’s the gestation period. You know the red car theory, you buy a red car and you start noticing the red cars everywhere. I identify this new dynamic around moments and the achievements of people playing games and then after that conversation they start noticing it, and once they see how many people are doing it, they go ‘Whoaa!’ and that’s when the inception kicks in. I’m sure that what’s happening. That happened to me. I inceptionized myself.

It obviously took some confidence to enter the industry the way you have. What do you tell the next young kid with a great idea?

Be as observant as you can. Figure out what the idea is, and then learn as much about the industry as you can. Find opinions from everybody. Be stealth publicly, but not to people you meet. I shared my idea with taxi drivers and Starbucks barristas. I told everyone my idea because I wanted to see if the regular Joe could understand my model. Get that well-rounded opinion and then know when to stop asking questions. You can’t learn and validate forever. When it feels right—start charging!

MISC Magazine Creative Challengers

For MISC Magazine, I recently had the opportunity to interview ten of what we are calling, “Creative Challengers,” or design thinkers who challenge conventional wisdom - “upsetting the status quo, seizing opportunities that others miss and improving systems by inventing new approaches and solutions.”

Working closely with Publisher/EIC, Idris Mootee, Editor, Ashley Perez, and Art Director, Jessica Tien who is responsible for the elegant collages that accompany each interview, we wanted to compile an impressive list but even more wanted to produce substantive content on each Challenger - meatier than your usual run-of-the-mill end-of-year magazine list. To this end, I interviewed each individual - to provide a feel for the forces he/she is driven by. Along with the expected (required) traits - bravery, perseverance, creativity, and a desire to change things - we were struck that across the board, these individuals were humble and curious lifelong learners.

I will post versions of some interviews here, or you may read the entire feature in PDF form here.

Below is a snippet of my interview with one of this year’s Challengers, Dave Eggers, the author of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Geniusand the mind behind 826 Valencia, a non-profit organization devoted to helping children and young adults develop writing skills.

Tell me about your inspiration for 826 Valencia, and the importance of one-on-one tutoring attention for students.

The original idea behind 826 Valencia was to build a simple drop-in tutoring center in the Mission District of San Francisco. We geared the services toward kids from non-English-speaking homes, kids who needed some extra one-on-one attention. I knew that huge leaps could be made through one-on-one interactions; studies say that a student can gain a grade level with 40 hours of one-on-one work. But after that, the center grew in dozens of unexpected ways — into student publishing, workshops, teacher assistance and advocacy, college access, scholarships. It keeps growing as the students grow.

You’ve published children’s works in print form, and found it motivational and transformative for them. It says something about the book as an artifact — that it can have that effect.

I was in Brooklyn yesterday, holding in my hands a young adult novel that was produced at 826NYC and afterward was acquired by a real, professional publisher. The kid was 16 when she wrote it, but it was good enough to attract an agent, a house, everything. And there are tons of students whose work deserves our attention, and they work like mad when they know their work will appear in a book. So we see publishing student work as honoring student voices, amplifying student thought.

Read the whole interview and others here.